Lucian took a look around and realized that these walls could be the last he would ever see. It was a dark, coal streaked room that was cool to the touch. He considered the walls too sterile, but the attendants said they gave his people comfort.
Perhaps his people needed the comfort; they had been killing themselves in droves lately. The small woman next door, Celestina, had burnt herself just last week. He had seen her that evening in a good mood, by afternoon she was a dead. The attendant told him that she had escaped and died voluntarily. Lucian believed him; she had the faintest outline of a smile on her charred face.
And yesterday a particularly elderly resident named Andrei had stabbed himself in the chest in the middle of the dining room. The residents were horrified, aghast, but Lucian could not help feeling a little impressed. Andrei was ancient, thought Lucian, who would have thought he had it in him? He could not stand, yet he mustered enough willpower to rip open his own ribs.
“Something to eat sir?” asked a pale attendant.
“No, thank you,” replied Lucian.
“You must eat, Mr. Dragomir,” said the attendant, “it’s required.”
Lucian gave a curt nod and took the tray of soup without a fight. Self-starvation is the quietest form of suicide, he thought, refrain from eating and you fade quietly back into the earth.
He ate the salty soup heartily. The hunger still gnawed at him, so he asked the attendant for another bowl and it too was soon gone. But his energy had not returned. Lucian looked down at the soup. It slakes my hunger, he thought, but it is not the same.
He looked around and took stock of his life. How did I end up here?, He thought, Dragomirs die in battle, in the hunt, or at the hands of their worst enemy. Dragomirs do not meet their end through decay. We do not die in rest homes.
Lucian thought of a way out. Perhaps starvation was the way to go. Perhaps he could escape like his neighbor Celestina and burn in the sun. There was no shame dying by one’s own hand. Dying in bed, that was shameful.
“Sir?” said the pale attendant.
“Yes?”
“Your son is here to see you.”
My son, he thought, what does he want from me now?
“Don’t bring him here,” he told the pale attendant. “I’ll meet him in the common room.”
/***/
Lucian wheeled himself out to the round oak table. It was quite dark, and Lucian’s eyes were not what they once were. He could barely see his son, but recognized his large frame in the shadows and smelled his strange odor. Dragomirs are thin like thieves, not thick like gangsters, thought Lucian, and we do not reek of Cologne.
“Good evening father,” said his son.
“Good evening Alexandru,” said Lucian.
His son laughed.
“I go by Al, you know that dad,” said his son, “even Alex would be ok, but Alexandru…”
“That was your great grandfather’s name. You should be proud.”
“I am,” said his son with a smile, “I just haven’t been called Alexandru in fifty years.”
Lucian was not appeased. His vision was adjusting to the dim light and could see that Al had a shaved head, goatee and a tan face. He was wearing a windbreaker.
